Shifter’s Mates: Jaguar’s Initiative

“Soledad Martinez, you are under arrest for piracy and treason. Stop your engines and prepare to be boarded.”

My mate’s voice rang through the comm, irritating me. Tapping the control, I said, “You can’t arrest me for treason. I’m not a citizen of Ximera.”

I’m not sure why I thought Markon would give up. He’d been chasing me for almost a year, and had only recently realized I was the pirate he had such a hard-on to catch. Of course, losing the Athena hadn’t helped. By now, everyone in three systems knew who her captain had been.

He growled, sounding almost like a jaguar, and I laughed. I loved irritating him. He wasn’t going to arrest me or demand my bite because he wasn’t going to catch me. Still, his low growl made my core clench and a trickle of arousal dampen my pants. The gods had been overly generous with my genetic mate. He was older by a number of years, but his honed cheekbones and green eyes nearly stopped my heart every time I was unwise enough to look at his image on my comm.

I refused to think about the number of times I’d pleasured myself after looking at his beautiful, branded face. I couldn’t have him until I’d kept my promise to my sisters.

One day, I would let him catch me and I’d give him my bite, but not before I found Tereza and Ursula. He certainly wasn’t going to apprehend me in orbit around an outpost I’d already terrified into submission.

I snarled as the engines on my SpaceRunner labored under the strain of dodging Markon’s tracer blasts. He wasn’t trying to blow me out of space. Instead, he was trying to force me to the ground, and I couldn’t stop him.

Even when it had been new, the Runner didn’t have nearly the capabilities of the Athena or any of the smaller craft housed in her bays. I cursed and dodged as a tracer blast nearly took out my starboard wing, the pulse engines groaning as the evasive action stressed the elderly low-orbit craft to its limits. Cursing Madran once more, I silenced the alarm telling me my aft stabilizer had gone offline.

My not-so-dearly departed crewmate had exposed the Athena to everyone during the battle for Earth in old Kansas City, rendering my beautiful mega cruiser useless for spying. Although still a threat to anyone with half a brain, the Athena’s value had been in the simple fact that no one knew she existed.

After my first mate Tani executed Madran, the appropriate punishment for a real traitor, we’d bought the Runner for a song from a Mendaran junk dealer who didn’t ask too many questions.

Claws burst from my fingertips when I heard Markon’s silky voice say, “Querida, you’ve lost at least one engine. Why don’t you give up and make things easier on all of us? You have my word that you won’t be harmed.”

“In your dreams,” I muttered, silencing the comm. I was afraid he was right. The Runner struggled to maintain altitude in space, further stressing the remaining engines. And my nearest bolt-hole was half a sector away in the Camdar system. I could limp there, but Markon wouldn’t let me get far before he locked a dock on me and started cutting his way inside.

How had Markon found me, anyway? I was supposed to be dead! My crew and I had watched the whole five days of my funeral celebration broadcast all over Ximeran space after I’d scuttled one of my own fast attacks to fake my death. We’d even started a drinking game. Every time someone made a speech and said what a gift I’d been to Ximera, we took shots of Mendaran brandy until we’d all drunk ourselves stupid. It was funny how I was a gift to the culture when I was dead, but a traitor when I was alive. I supposed that was the magic of revisionist history.

At least Tani had remembered the epitaph we’d laughed about all those weeks ago. I’d loved seeing the expressions on everyone’s faces when they read it.

Here lies that fucking pirate. May she rest in pieces.

I’d blocked the familial contact with Zeusef, who had begun serving on Markon’s ship. That left two possibilities. Either someone else on my crew was a traitor, or that know-it-all snow leopard had tattled. I didn’t want to think that another of my crew would do such a thing, especially after Madran betrayed me and her Unwanted sisters.

The damage was done, and not only would I have to continue to dodge Markon, but the rest of my enemies as well, and without the Athena. I couldn’t risk the five hundred females who had entrusted their lives to me. Angry tears filled my eyes as I turned the laboring Runner into the atmosphere of outpost four. My mate was insane if he thought I was going to make things easy for him. Yet once I entered the thick atmosphere, Markon backed off, apparently content to let me land without dogging my footsteps.

The heavy air made the Runner shimmy as if it was trying to rattle itself apart. I nudged the throttle, desperate for enough speed to reach the lowland swamps on the delta of the Zamoch River. It was as good a place to hide as any, and once I was in the subtropical jungle, it would be easy enough to disappear and buy or steal another ship.

The SpaceRunner had one benefit. Its dull gray hull reflected light, making it very difficult to see against the daytime sky. As long as I kept to the cloud cover, Markon would have to work to find me. If I could keep the Runner in the air until I was ready to set it down, I’d outfly him easily.

As the expanse of the Zamoch delta appeared in front of me, I cut the engines, allowing my battered craft to glide on approach. The rippling water loomed closer as I touched the controls for the rudder and eased the Runner into the water. I popped the emergency door and cut all power, the alarm counting down seconds as I let my jaguar take over. The Runner sank as we swam away, leaving my flight suit behind. I’d find clothes after I escaped Markon.

When we reached the shore, we shook, sending water flying. The humid heat warmed us and we wrinkled our muzzle to catch the scent of anything strange. Massive trees sunk roots deep into the marshy soil and towered against the sky as a barrier to the thick jungle behind them. Although it wasn’t our beloved, dying Amazon, it was similar enough to make us comfortable.

We slid between two trees, hearing the click under our paw a second too late. Roaring in rage, we tried to claw our way free as a huge net swept us up into the air. We might have been able to tear a hole in the net, but the woven strands of flexible metal resisted our attempts. Our enraged movements sent us swinging as our genetic mate sauntered into view, a smirk on his gorgeous face.

“Gotcha.”

Wearing black armor, he had his hair swept into a queue that trailed past his shoulder blades. His green eyes flickered at us with malicious delight, and we hid our shiver with a throaty snarl that sent birds scattering.

Reaching upward, he tapped my nose and jerked his hand back when I snapped at him. “The old internet vids were right,” he murmured before tickling the pads of my paws. “Nose boops and toe beans are fun.”

Baring my teeth, I snarled, wishing I could take his hand off for touching me.

He pushed against the net, sending us spinning once more. “I had a feeling you’d come here, Soledad, and as you’ve noticed, I made plans.” He reached through the net and tugged our tail, earning himself another roar.

Markon laughed and held up a syringe, then jabbed it into our haunch. Our vision wavered as our legs went numb. As he lowered us to the ground, he said, “And I am really fucking tired of chasing you.”